Not, as you might think from the title, a crafty Netflix attempt to cash in on the expanding Spider-Verse, Spiderhead is, in fact, am intriguing new psychological thriller starring Chris Hemsworth, Miles Teller and Jurnee Smollett.
Directed by Joseph Kosinski (who, thanks to the release delays for Top Gun: Maverick now has films coming out in consecutive months this year) from a script by Deadpool's Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, Spiderhead adapts George Saunders' short story.
Here's the basics... In a state-of-the-art penitentiary run by brilliant visionary Steve Abnesti (Hemsworth), inmates wear a surgically attached device that administers dosages of mind-altering drugs in exchange for commuted sentences. There are no bars, no cells, or orange jumpsuits.
In Spiderhead, incarcerated volunteers are free to be themselves. Until they’re not. At times, they’re a better version. Need to lighten up? There’s a drug for that. At a loss for words? There’s a drug for that, too. But when two subjects, Jeff (Teller) and Lizzy (Smollett), form a connection, their path to redemption take a twistier turn, as Abnesti’s experiments start to push the limits of free will altogether.
Spiderhead will arrive on Netflix on 17 June.